Getting into a top b-school is just the beginning of your MBA journey, but it is what you do in the next two years that will determine your career. More importantly, the summer placements are what will be the most crucial part of this journey in the next two years. InsideIIM conducted a one of its kind workshop called the Konversations Cafe with companies Shell, ABGLP, and HUL at That Comedy Club in Bangalore on 18th May 2018 to give b-school students a chance to prepare better for their life at a b-school, and their dream internship experience!
A place that is known for stand-up comedies and performances, saw 80 enthusiastic students from India's top b-schools meet their dream companies for an informal session on everything from careers to internship experiences and placements. InsideIIM is a platform for expression and stories and this event was no different. Candidates were allowed to ask whatever they wanted without the prying eyes of professors and placecomm, and stories of great careers and industry experiences were shared by different companies as well!
This is the second season of Konversations Cafe and it was held for the first time in Bangalore. Sidenote: If you missed it in Bangalore, a similar workshop is happening in Mumbai at Canvas Laugh Club on 25th May 2018. Register
here and send us your offer letter and resume on
ayana@insideiim.com to book your seat now!
Coming back to the event in Bangalore, apart from the sessions conducted by the three dream companies, we had a 'Faccha' quiz conducted by Kunj Sanghvi, Content Head at InsideIIM-Konversations, a session on Guesstimates by Miti Vaidya, Product Manager at Konversations, some networking over lunch, another quiz session by HUL, a lot of Magnum Icecreams, and lots of goodies and incessant questions by the audience!
After a small introduction by Ankit Doshi, the creator of InsideIIM-Konversations, the event started with a bang with the quiz session!
After the b-school quiz, Miti Vaidya took over the stage to conduct a small but interesting session on Guesstimates - the most important thing when it comes to cracking interviews for consulting. Some tips and a case or two were solved by the audience!
The first company session began with Shell.
Their first speaker was Abhinandan Kohli, who has been working with Shell for the past 7 years. He shared some great stories from his travels across the world for his job as a Petrophysicist at Shell. From Italy to Iraq, and even Antarctica!
Kunj in conversation with Abhinandan Kohli
The next speaker from Shell was Amit Wali, a TISS Alumnus. He took on the lighter side of the MBA life by sharing some campus stories that will make a lot of sense to b-school students once they join. He said, "In six months, you will refer to IIM Ahmedabad and IIM Bangalore as just A and B. You simply won't have time to say the whole word!"
There was ample time for some Q&A. Our future B-Schoolers had some interesting questions to ask:
What is it that a recruiter looks for in an applicant?
What are the job roles offered by the company?
What profiles are they looking for?
Team Shell answered all the questions patiently and with satisfying details.
We broke for lunch after the morning session with Shell, but it's not only lunch when you have 80 students from different b-schools and campus recruiters on the same floor!
The afternoon session saw Team ABGLP take over the stage!
Kunj in conversation with Atul Agarwal
ABGLP's first speaker Atul Agarwal is the Product Manager at New Initiatives in Aditya Birla Fashion & Retail Ltd. division and he is an IIM Lucknow Alumnus. He is currently working with Madura Fashion & Lifestyle, one of India's fastest growing branded apparel companies and a premium lifestyle player in the retail sector.
Here's what he had to say about ABG, "I never got bored in my 5 years at ABGLP. When I got bored, I asked for a new role and got it!"
ABGLP's next speaker, Sourav Sengupta is an IIM Ahmedabad Alumnus.
He said, "forget about these IIT / IIM tags. 3-4 years out of campus what will stay with you are the friendships you made there." You bet!
Shubhangi Jain addressed the crowd next. She is from MDI-HR (Class of 2017) and is currently working at ABG. She said, "I had heard that HR is the one who just organizes picnics... But my internship was in Compensation & Benefits, where I worked mostly with numbers and now I'm doing HR Analytics."
The last session saw speakers from HUL, where the ice cream man and the campus recruiter herself came for the session. What's more? They bought a lot of goodies with them!
Meet Himanshu, GM for Icecreams at HUL
He spoke about what you should and shouldn't do in the first few years after an MBA, especially once you start looking for a job. "There will be a point that you will be making more money than you need; it's important that you do what you love from the start so you don't feel the need to switch every few years."
Next, we had Kriti from HUL, who spoke about how HUL grooms its leaders and briefed the students about Unilever’s Future Leadership Programme.
Riya talks about her experiences at HUL. From Tokyo to Rajkot, she has seen it all.
And no HUL session is complete without any goodies. From t-shirts to diaries and of course icecreams, they had everything covered. Some lucky students also won additional goodies in the quiz conducted by HUL.
The event ended with Ankit thanking everyone for their support and participation in the workshop and the attendees were given certificates for attending and participating in the event!
If you missed this event, don't worry. We have the last event for this season on 25th May 2018 in Mumbai. All you need to do is register
here, send your offer letters and resume at
ayana@insideiim.com, and show up on the D-Day!